Search+for+Meaning+in+America+Topic+2

Topic
toc **Theme:** "Search for Meaning in America"
 * Short Stories/Poems **

Students will continue to reflect on the emerging theme, "search for meaning in America" through the reading and analyzing of short stories and poems. Students will continue to use comparing and contrasting, inferencing, and interpreting techniques to cite textual evidence to support the theme and the author's point of view. Students will be analyzing the authors' use of tone, moral issues, allusions, figurative language to enhance the emerging theme. Literary paragraphs, controlling idea paragraph, comparing and contrasting poems, and a critical analysis essay are some of the highlights of this topic.

Common Core Standards

 * RL.11-12.4**: Demonstrate knowledge of eighteenth-, nineteenth-, and early twentieth-century foundational works of American literature, including how two or more texts from the same period treat similar themes or topics
 * RI.11-12.6:** Determine an author's point of view or purpose in a text in which the rhetoric is particularly effective
 * RL.11-12.6:** Analyze how style and content contribute to the power, persuasivenessess, or beauty of the text
 * RL.11-12.1:** Cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly
 * RL.11-12.3:** Analyze multiple interpretations of a story, drama, or poem, evaluating how each version interprets the source text.
 * RL.11-12.3:** Analyze the impact of the author's choice regarding how to develop and relate elements of a story or drama(e.g. where a story is set, how the action is ordered, how the characters are introduced and developed.
 * RL.11-12.7:** Analyze multiple interpretations of a story, drama, or poem(e.g., recorded or live production of a play or recorded novel or poetry), evaluating how each version interprets the source text
 * RI.11-12.2:** Determine two or more central ideas/themes of a text and analyze their development over the course of the text, including how they interact and build on one another to provide a complex anaylsis
 * RI.11-12.3:** Analyze a complex set of ideas or sequence of events and explain how specific individuals, ideas, or events interact and develop over the course of the text
 * W.11-12.2:** Write informative/explanatory texts to examine and convey complex ideas, concepts, and information clearly and accurately through the effective selection, organization, and analysis of content
 * W.11-12.3:** Write narrative to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, well-chosen details, and well-structured event sequences
 * W.11-12.6:** Use technology, including the Internet, to produce, publish, and update individual or shared writing products in response to ongoing feedback, including new arguments or information
 * W.11-12.4:** Produce clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization, and style are appropriate to task, purpose, and audience
 * W.11-12.10:** Write routinely over extended time frames(time for research, reflection, and revision) and shorter time frames for a range of tasks, purposes
 * W. 11-12.9**: Draw evidence from literary or informational texts to support analysis, reflection, and research.
 * SL.11-12.1:** Initiate and participate effectively in a range of collaborative discussions(one-on-one, in groups,) with diverse partners on grades 11 topics, texts, and issues, building on others' ideas and expressing their own clearly and persuasively.
 * SL.11-12.2:** Integrate multiple sources of information presented in diverse formats and media in order to make informed decisions and solve problems, evaluating the credibility and accuracy of each source and noting any discrepancies among the data
 * L.11-12.1:** Demonstrate command of the conventions of standard English grammar and usage when writing or speaking.
 * L.11-12.3**: Apply knowledge of language to understand how language functions in different contexts, to make effective choices for meaning or style, and to comprehend more fully when reading or listening.
 * L.11-12.4:** Determine or clarify the meaning of unknown and multiple-meaning words and phrases based on grades 11-12 reading and content, choosing flexibly from a range of strategies.
 * L.11-12.5:** Demonstrate understanding of figurative language, word relationships, and nuances in word meanings.
 * L.11-12.6:** Acquire and use accurately general academic and domain-specific words and phrases, sufficient for reading, writing, speaking, and listening at the college and career readiness level.
 * L11-12.6:** Demonstrate independence in gathering vocabulary knowledge when considering a word or phrase important to comprehension or expression

Suggested Student Objectives

 * Apply literal, interpretive, and critical thinking skills to a text**(RL.11-12.1), (RL.11-12.7)**
 * Analyze how allusion, irony, and/or tone are expressed in works of fiction (**L.11-12.5), (****RL.11-12.3), (L.11-12.5)**
 * Develop vocabulary by identifying the use of denotation and connotation(**L.11-12.4)**
 * Identify a controlling __idea__ that exist between texts, evaluating how each source text treats the idea( **W.11-12.2), (****RL.11-12.1)**
 * Interpret quotations through a critical analysis essay. **(RL.11-12.1), (WL.11-12.4), (Wl.11-12.5)**
 * Analyze similar themes in the writer's complex writing style (**W. 11-12.9), (RI.11-12.3)**
 * Identify figurative language as means of introducing an author's tone (**L.11-12.5), (****RL.11-12.3)**
 * Recognize differences between theatrical genre and fiction and poetry. **(RL.11-12.1), (RL.11-12.5)**
 * Examine an author's use of imagery, **(RL.11-12.3)**
 * Determine what contributes to dilemmas**.(RL.11-12.3)**
 * Examine cause and effect as ironic. **(L11-12.5),**
 * Determine the author's purpose for choosing a specific title. **(RL.11-12.3)**

Suggested Additional Readings

 * "The Cold Within" (James Patrick Kinney) Poem- Internet
 * "Richard Cory" (Robinson) Poem - Prentice Hall //Literature: The American Experience, p 682//
 * "Fire and Ice" (Frost) Poem- Prentice Hall //Literature: The American Experience, p. 945//
 * From "A Chant of Darkness" (Helen Keller) Poem - Fearon's //American Literature pp. 110-113 or Internet//
 * "In the Depths of Solitude" (Tupac) Poem - //SpringBoard:Eng////lish Textual Power, Level 6,// p.365
 * "Lucinda Matlock" (Edgar Masters' Spoon River Anthology) Poem -Prentice Hall //Literature: The American Experience, p. 686//
 * "Main Street" (Sinclair Lewis) Selection - Internet
 * "Blessed Be The Tie that Binds" (Hymn) - Internet
 * "A Summer's Reading" (Bernard Malamud) Short Story -//American Literature: Scholastic Scopes Literature pp. 614-621 or Internet//
 * "Sweat" (Zora Neale Hurston) Short Story - //SpringBoard:English Textual Power, Level 6, pp. 298-308//
 * "Love of Life" (Jack London) Short Story - //American Literature: Scholastic Scopes Literature,// pp. 374-380 or //Internet//

Resource Links
Prentice Hall //Literature: The American Experience// Fearon's //American Literature (Teacher Copy)// //[|www.cordula.cos/poems/coldwithin.html]// The Cold Within by James Patrick Kinney Blessed be the Tie that Binds //[|www.hymntime.com/tch/html/b/b/t/bbttb.htm]// //American Literature: Scholastic Scopes Literature (Teacher Copy)// //SpringBoard:English Textual Power, Level 6//

Activities

 * COLLABORATE**
 * Create a list of Biblical allusions in the texts(work in pairs) and discussed list with other groups. **SL.11-12.1**
 * Discuss the significance of the recurring motif, "Blessed Be the Tie That Binds" in //Our Town//. **RL.11-12.1,** **RI.11-12.2**
 * Make a personal connection to transcendentalism by referencing contemporary texts( e.g. song/lyrics, videos, films, television shows, etc. "In the Depths of Solitude" by Tupac). **RL.11-12.7, SL.11-12.1**
 * Choose two works from this topic and identify and discuss the moral issues introduced (group work).
 * Work with a partner to draw a conclusion as to why a selection is given a specific title by the author.
 * READ**
 * Read and analyze the use of tone from two works of fiction (short story) in this unit. **RI.11-12.2,** **RL.11-12.3**
 * Read Robinson's poem "Richard Cory" and the lyrics to Paul Simon's ballad- style song of the same title and note the similarities and differences. **RL.11-12.3**
 * WRITE**
 * Select a passage from one of the poems and another from one of the informational texts and/or short story that treat a similar theme and write an informative/explanatory essay, using at least three pieces of textual evidence to support an original thesis statement **W.11-12.2,** **L.11-12.3,** **W. 11-12.9**
 * Compare and contrast the figurative and connotative meanings as well as specific word choices in two of the poems(Dickinson's poem) in order to determine how the metaphors shape the meaning and tone of each poem **RL.11-12.4,** **L.11-12.3**
 * Write a well-developed paragraph based on an author's use of a literary technique or element to enhance an appreciation of the text. **RL.11-12.3,** **W.11-12.3**
 * Choose two texts from this unit and write a controlling idea paragraph, using specific support and specific details from each text. **W.11-12.2,** **RL.11-12.1**
 * Write an evaluation as to how characters escape from reality. Use textual evidence to support your response**. W.11-12.9, L.11-12.5**
 * Create a cause-effect chart based on the characters' actions leading to the end result. Choose any two characters from different genres. **W.11-12.9, RL.11-12.3**

Assessments
The teacher will conduct observations and assistance during class activities. Students will be assessed through responses to oral questioning and appropriate homework assignments. The students will be assessed on the group or oral assignments through a group and individual rubric by teacher and peer feedback and/or written comments. Students' paragraphs and essays will be assessed through the use of an essay rubric based on the specific type of writing. In addition, individual writing conferences will be conducted. Students' responses to interpretative questions following each selection will be graded, either orally or written. Students will complete a check test and/or quiz after the completion of each section of the texts.